In the Place Where the End Begins
by Reiku Toukijin
Summary: Eighteen years after the defeat of Naraku, Mama Higurashi receives a visit from an unlikely person.


She closes her eyes, tilting her head back, as a light afternoon rain pattered against the cobblestones around her. The cool rain is a welcomed relief from the heat of late summer.

Sighing softly, Asako Higurashi opens her eyes and begins to busy herself with her chores. There is more work, almost too much work, now that Father has past on and Souta is away a school.

An almost not smile, creases her brow as she looks over at the tiny shrine that houses Bone Eater's well. She raises her hand and brushes the rain from her eyes.

Her son is going to be a doctor and her daughter…

_Kagome is… _

"Pardon me?"

Asako utters a tiny cry, more surprise than fear, and turns, a bit too quickly on the glass slick-stones. She slips, stumbles, and is caught by slender hands. Trembling she looks up and meets eyes of the purest gold.

"You're a…a youkai?" she whispers, more hopeful than afraid of the razor claws pricking her upper arms. "Aren't you?"

The woman --no a girl, no older than Kagome was the last she saw her-- seems resigned as she slowly nods.

"Yes," she says, "Can we talk somewhere?"

---

Ragged, worn, and tired, Kagome stared down into the bottom of Bone Eater's Well.

"No," she said, grinding at the dirt with her heels. "No!"

Her shriek echoed in the rickety old well shaft, scattering dust around her. She dropped to her knees. "It's not fair," she cried, her voice spilling out into the forest from the darkened shaft. "It's not fair!"

---

"More tea, Kitsumi-san?"

Kitsumi smiles and declines with a barely perceptible nod. Her head is bowed, hair dark and softly curling as Kagome's had been, falling down into her eyes. Her claw click as she traces imaginary circles across the kitchen table

"I knew your daughter," she says after a long while. Then she looks up, golden eyes meet brown imploring. "Before she died-" She shook her head, smiling softly. "I'm sorry, Higurashi-san, for me it's been well over five hundred years."

Kitsumi rises with a grace that could not be taught and begins to pace the room. She pauses at the refrigerator, staring at an old photo secured with rusty magnet. "But I'm too young to remember when she looked like this."

"Kitsumi-san…"

She turns and frowns at the old human woman. "She asked me to tell you what happened to her. Why she never came home."

With unsteady hands, Asako sets down her teacup and makes a begging motion with her hands.

"Please," she begins, her voice so close to pleading, "Please, tell me what happened to my Kagome."

Kitsumi breathes a sigh, wondering exactly this is difficult. "It's starts where it began. With the well."

---

"What do you mean the well's not working?" demanded Inuyasha. He was belligerent and angry and oh, so very worried. "What the fuck did you do to it, Kagome?"

"Osuwa-" her words were lost in a sob. "Don't you understand what this means, Inuyasha?"

Inuyasha tried to look at her, but could not meet her eyes.

"I can't go home," she repeated through her tears. He knew as well she did. "I'll never see Mama or Souta or…anyone again."

---

Asako watches the girl-woman-youkai with a sort morbid urgency. "The well stopped working? How?"

"How was it possible that worked in the first place?" Kitsumi chides, eyes distant and sinking. "Such things are of fairytales and madman's fancy."

_Just like you. _Asako wants to reply, but instead twists her hands together waiting patiently for tattered scraps of truth. She has so many questions, too many, all of which demand answers. "I see."

"No you don't," Kitsumi murmurs, enigmatic, and shakes her head. For a brief moment, her almost human illusion falters to reveal a moon-marked brow and pale cheeks emblazoned with jagged crimson stripes.

Her eyes are shimmering gold and her hair isn't black, but rather dark, dark violet. She's beautiful, too beautiful, and too perfect to be real.

_Perhaps she's not real_, Asako thinks even as words trip off her tongue. _Perhaps I'm dreaming_. _Perhaps I'm just so lonely that… _"How do you know my daughter? Is she your-"

"My aunt," Kitsumi sighs, lips curling into a tiny smirk. "Kagome was my aunt. Even if my father and uncle were barely on speaking terms."

"Oh." Asako bows her head, heart sinking. "With your hair and eyes, I thought...I'm sorry. Was your mother another youkai?"

Kitsumi's smile is one of bemusement and vague apology. "Of a sort." Her smile fades around the edges. "She is a great dragon who once rampaged the lands of far West."

"You don't look like a dragon."

The statement is so innocent, so obvious, and Kitsumi wonders what sort woman could readily accept tales of time displaced miko and dragons.

_The same type of woman who could lose a daughter down a magic well… _

"Not in this form," she says and taps her chin for a moment. She breaths, shaking her hair from her shoulders. "They --Aunt Kagome, Uncle Inuyasha-- tried to find a way to reopen the well, but nothing worked."

---

"Is staying here so terrible?" Inuyasha asked after the well had been sealed for nearly a month. He made a face. "I know we don't have shampoo or any of that other shit you like but…keh! Never mind. I shoulda figured you'd want to leave the first chance you got."

"Inuyasha." Kagome hugged her legs, burying her face in her knees, and sighed loudly. "It's not like that, it's just…"

"Just what?"

She sighed again, this time poignant. "It's just…do you remember when your mother died?"

Inuyasha eyed her, eyes narrowed, almost scowling. "I was just a brat."

"But you remember," Kagome insisted.

"Yeah."

Kagome nodded, sobs bunching in her throat. "That's how I feel."

Inuyasha snorted and crossed his arms over his chest. For a moment, he looked all his sixty-five plus years. "Your family ain't dead, Kagome. So quit crying about it. It's not like you to be so damn selfish."

Kagome glared at him, dumbfounded, an "osuwari" hanging on her tongue. The beads were gone, but old habits die hard.

"How dare you!" she snapped, eyes blazing. "If I was selfish I wouldn't be in this mess."

"I know, Kagome," Inuyasha said with unusual gentleness. "Which is why you should be selfish now." He met Kagome's gaze, holding it unsteadily. "Try to be happy, even if it's without them."

---

"It was difficult, at first," Kitsumi explains, laughter in her voice. "Aunt Kagome had to learn about living and feeding herself without the help of the modern era. And Uncle Inuyasha had to learn to be more than just a protector."

"Where they happy?" Asako asks, eyes sparkling with tears. She watches Kitsumi glide forward, her feet not quite touching the floor. "Tell me they were happy."

Kitsumi tilts her head, listening to something unheard in the distance. "They had several children."

Asako doesn't seem to notice the strain in Kitsumi's voice or realize she dodged the question.

"They did! Oh! What were they're names? What did they look like?" Tears glitter on Asako's cheeks, despite the smile splitting her face. "Did they have Inuyasha's ears? He was the father, right?"

Kitsumi chuckles and bites back a sudden pang of guilt. "Yes, he was."

---

"Seiji! Get back here!" Kagome yelled, chasing after her four-year-old son. The child squealed, giggling as he dodged her grasping arms.

"Noooo!" the little boy exclaimed, before ducking behind shoji screen. "I'm waitin' for Papa!"

Kagome inched closer, grinning as the child darted from behind the screen.

"C'mon Seiji-chan," she coaxed, voice cracking with laughter. "If you go to sleep, Papa will be home when you wake up."

The little boy blinked his wide blue eyes. "Wreally?"

Kagome nodded, biting back a grin. "And guess who's coming to visit?" she asked, tucking the child onto his pallet on the floor.

"Unkale Sechomabo?" Seiji asked, grinning at his mother's nod.

"You like your uncle, huh?"

"Yup!" The little boy nodded enthusiastically. "An' when I get older, I wanna be as strong as him!"

Kagome bowed her head, hiding an eye roll. "Don't let your father hear you say that."

"Don't let me hear what?"

"PAPA!" squealed Seiji, leaping bodily from the pallet, nearly knocking Kagome over in his enthusiasm. "Papa, Papa, Papa." The boy chanted as scampered around his father's legs.

Inuyasha lifted the little boy up by the back of his yukata. "Hey, brat," he said, ears twitching. "You been good for your mom?"

"Uh huh," Seiji chirped, then wrinkled his nose. "An' I had to weed the garden."

"Did you?" Inuyasha asked, smirking at the little boy's nod. "I bet you ate all the pears, too."

Seiji smiled, shy at first, then widening into a mischievous grin. "Yup!"

Laughing, Inuyasha set the boy down on the floor. "Go see if your Uncle Miroku needs help. Your mom and I gotta talk."

"'kay!" Seiji made a face. "You're not gonna kiss 'n stuff, are you?"

"Seiji-chan!"

Seiji stared at his mother with wide wyes, wondering why she suddenly so flustered. "What?"

"Go on, kiddo," Inuyasha said, shooing the child with a light pat on the bottom. "I hear him callin' you."

"You know Miroku-sama is just going to use him to pick up girls," Kagome chastised when Seiji was out of earshot.

"Keh," Inuyasha snorted. "I'm still wondering how he ever talked Sango into marrying him."

"Sango-chan loves him and all he does is flirt." Kagome smiled as Inuyasha wrapped his arm around her. Five years had changed them both for the better. She leaned into him, laying her head on his shoulder. "How was your trip?"

"Fine." Inuyasha tightened his arm just slightly. "Sesshoumaru has a woman. Some dragon bitch from the far west-" he paused at the sight of Kagome's raised eyebrows-Keh! Don't look at me like that! His mother told me. Fuck! That woman just goes on and on and-"

"She couldn't help, could she?"

His arm tightened until it was almost painful. "No. I know I told you, I'd find a way to fix the well, but…damn it!"

Kagome buried her face into the hollow of his throat and smiled against his skin. "Don't be. I'm happy here."

"No. Don't just give up."

She hugged him suddenly, smiling broadly. "Never," she quipped. "I'm not sure how, but someday, I'll find a way to tell them what happened. They'll know I was happy."

---

Kitsumi leaves Higurashi shrine late that evening with a new friend and a heavy heart. She feels guilty, although, she's not quite certain as to why.

"Kitsumi."

She stops on the stairs leading to her lonely apartment, but doesn't turn around. She doesn't need to. "Father." Her lips quirk into what could have been a smile. "Have you ever felt ashamed and not known why?"

Sesshoumaru says nothing and Kitsumi doesn't have to turn around to know he's frowning.

"I thought not." She turns and leans her elbows on the rail. She looks thoughtful or perhaps sad. It's impossible to tell. "I visited Aunt Kagome's mother today, but I suppose you already know that."

"Yes." Sesshoumaru strides forward with the same liquid grace possessed by his daughter. "I also know you wasted your time."

"It was my time to waste," she replies, her hand smoothing over her slightly distended belly. "And I promised Aunt Kagome."

"Your affection for humans will be your undoing."

Gold eyes meet gold, clash and hold. "That's an ironic statement coming from the father of several hanyou."

"Am I to be the grandfather of one, as well?"

Kitsumi wonders for a moment if it is worry or disgust she sees glitter in her father's eyes. "It's really none of your business whom I dally with," she begins, her voice haughty. "But I will ease your mind and say I'm not so reckless to couple with a human."

Sesshoumaru's eyes narrow at the thinly veiled insult. "Who is he?"

"What does it matter?" Kitsumi muses, straightening just slightly. "This child is mine."

"You are mine."

A moment passes and wind picks up, sailing through their hair and clothes.

"I suppose," Kitsumi admits, humor edging in her voice. "But it's still my business." She ignores his glare to stare up at the dun colored sky. It will rain again tonight.

"I couldn't tell Higurashi-san everything," she says, sighing to herself. "I couldn't tell her that Aunt Kagome became a senile old woman or most winters she and Uncle Inuyasha nearly starved to death."

"That's what happened."

"Yes." Kitsumi eyes her father for a moment. "And Uncle Inuyasha died saving your life. A fact I also omitted."

"The half-breed's stupidity-"

"-saved your life," Kitsumi finishes. "And mine, considering I hadn't been conceived yet."

"You feel guilty."

"I feel indebted," she snaps, tone sharp. "One of us should."

Silence stretches between them, long and tense, until father and daughter almost forgot who had first been speaking.

"You were merciful," Sesshoumaru says, finally, allowing the insult to pass. "And attempted to spare the old woman's feelings."

Kitsumi snorts, climbing the stairs to her apartment. "Is that what they call lying these days?" She tries, but cannot bring herself to open her apartment door. "Higurashi-san seemed so lonely and so sad that I couldn't… I told her they were happy."

Biting her bottom lip, she turns to look at her father for reassurance. "They were happy, weren't they, Father?"

---

Kagome awoke to the sound of an infant wailing. For a moment, before wakefulness fully claimed her, she thought it was one of her own. It was impossible. Her children were grown with children of their own.

"Forgive me, Kagome-sama," called a voice from the other side of the room. "We didn't mean to wake you."

"Sango-" _No, not Sango. We buried Sango-chan last winter and Miroku-sama the spring after… _

"It's Miyu," said the daiyoukai woman, rocking her crying baby in her arms. "Kitsumi is fussy today. Aren't you?" Miyu cooed to her daughter. "Just like your father."

Kagome smiled. She couldn't exactly picture Sesshoumaru as fussy.

"Would you like to hold her?" Miyu asked, drawing closer at Kagome's nod. "Be careful of her claws."

Kagome smiled down at the infant nestled in crook of her elbow. "Aya-chan has claws," she said, knowingly. "She's the only one. My boys never really showed any youkai traits."

"She's the one who married into the Houjou clan?" Miyu asked as she lowered herself to floor.

"Yes," Kagome answered, smiling at the thought of her Houjou so many centuries away. Was it coincidence or fate? "Her children have Inuyasha's eyes." She rocked Kitsumi lightly, smiling as the child's whimpers became happy gurgles.

"Kitsumi's are poisoned, like her father's," Miyu said, her voice filled with maternal pride. "She's the best of both us, Sesshoumaru and I."

"She's beautiful."

"Yes, she is. And she adores her Aunt Kagome," Miyu mused as she stroked Kitsumi's cheek. "We wish you'd come stay at the castle."

Kagome sighed and pressed a kiss the end of Kitsumi's button nose.

"This is my home Miyu-sama, I can't leave it. Besides, I'm happy here."

---

Sesshoumaru stands outside Kitsumi's door long after she had gone inside. "Yes," he says, knowing she can't hear, but saying it anyway. "They were happy."

---Fin---


End file.
